


Nothing the God of Biomechanics Wouldn't Let You in Heaven For

by Estivate



Category: Thor (Movies)
Genre: (born sexy yesterday), (who honestly tries his best), Be Prepared for Anything, Blade Runner AU, Cyberpunk AU, Dark Thor, Intersex Loki (Marvel), M/M, Neo-Noir, Replicant Loki
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-04-28
Updated: 2019-04-28
Packaged: 2020-02-08 18:56:37
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,269
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18629281
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Estivate/pseuds/Estivate
Summary: Life was now just one desperate hedonistic distraction to another, currency scrounged enough for either sustenance, intoxication, or ecstasy. All Thor needs to do is put a bullet through the skull of the wealthiest bidder however, and he’d have enough for all three.For the next little while at least.He kept walking, pausing only to confirm the sound of something or someone dying in the interzone between pleasure houses – architecture sculpted in the likeness of body contours, towards the sensual pink glow of the brightest blocks, nude holographic models danced above the domes, figures swaying in choreography under the low hanging skies, always pregnant with rain. Paradise was the name of this part: a kinder breed of sin than the world spinning rotten on its axis.





	Nothing the God of Biomechanics Wouldn't Let You in Heaven For

**Author's Note:**

  * For [tkillamockingbird (Theboys)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Theboys/gifts).



> For tkillamockingbird (Theboys), whom I miss lots and lots, and hope school is treating well.

 

 

His needs were few, but money counted as one of them. Turning down an assignment simply wasn’t an option.

 

“It’s no one you’ll feel bad for.” came the scattered digital graphic of a face given intonation and mouthing motions. He never knew who it was he was talking to, the texture was only an interactive visual, and for the clients who were confident their sums would never be turned down, likely pre-recorded. Though considering how long this one had been since the last job…maybe he ought to ask.

 

But then the funds transfer with a blip and the urge passes. He almost misses the target profile and location that flashes on due to the unexpected extra digit placement. The information stays only a moment, just long enough to memorize – he catches it for a little longer in the fading photonegative behind his eyelids.

 

“Best get going before nightfall.” The order is monotonous. Encryptedly impersonal. And doesn’t linger for any questions about how. The connection cuts, and Thor is alone in the strict rectangular prism of his unit complex. The narrow window, horizontal - about the length of his body and of eye-level when lying down, let in as much light as Thor ever required: never much, and not simply because he didn’t need it.

 

Sitting up, he sighs. It’ll be enough not to have to take on odd jobs in strange corners of the outer-city when he wasn’t dreaming of cyberspace. He should be relieved.

 

His broad body took up the width of the temper foam slab that he slept on, and then he gets up without further preamble, looking with as much consideration as a man on someone else’s mission at the other side of the bay, where big business invariably took him towards the bright lattices of the city. 

 

Then, wordlessly dresses with measured ease in the feather grey glow of dawn geodesics.

 

\---

 

The wide coat collar he could hide the lower half of his face in, but his frame meant he still stood out amongst the streaming crowds. Thor didn’t tend to dawdle or meander, didn’t like anything between him and his mark except a straight line, but if money was coming his way – technically already landed – he may as well indulge. He doesn’t anticipate today’s call to be his last, but then they never do.  

 

He’s taken out guys merely on the job, like him, and he always bet they wish they’d had a final hit instead of waiting.

 

In the outskirts of the city you could get anything in the order of modifications, drugs, or enhancements. In the narrow borderland of older streets, between upgraded neon factory bars or shell corporate arcology cubes, was the tacit experimental ground for private researchers with products to distribute and test on the black market. Anything that became popular enough here first then became bottled and prescribed on the screened Sakar high-rise. Thor always had the impression that the company’s deranged gold-suited CEO kept his thumb on the fast-forward button here.

 

As exciting as the prospect was, one could never be too careful. Life here was balancing the disc’s edge of needing to hustle to stay afloat but move too swiftly and you’d break the surface tension of the unspoken underworld rules. Either way you’d be gone – though the rest of your organs likely went in service of whichever stranger that had the money to buy them: vultures within the city’s clinics. Every week a small fortune circulated between the individuals who hoarded genetic surgeons and pickled themselves in a vat of serums and hormones. En certainly did, that much was undeniable.

 

But Thor isn’t here for anything that extreme.

 

\---

 

“You’re breaking my heart Sif.”

 

As a dealer she was invaluable. She never passed them anything less than triple black-market price, but untainted goods were always a sure exchange and he needed that. Though there’d been times when he was tempted to turn to others.

 

Warm rain beaded on her black vinyl jacket. “And what if I turn down the money? Should I be concerned by who it came from?” raising a dark eyebrow. The last she’d seen of Thor, the arc of his self-destruction had started becoming noticeable even to his clients, with jobs increasingly fewer in between. She worries if this is a final play, fast and loose, just something to mark the thrill and go out in a blaze.

 

“This one’s straightforward. A clean hit and I can dash.” 

 

For a time, Thor had been one of her best customers. His type almost always started out on a constant adrenaline rush. The speed he rode, the turns he’d taken, the targets he cut. The city was a playground of hopes fading nightly, with all that they’d done. High octane runs that wore you down until the streets themselves locked you in like a maze.

 

“Just outside the arcade last night, I saw a guy fry his own nerves on mycotoxin.”

 

Thor frowns. He hopes she didn’t catch wind of him looking for other suppliers. He never followed through in the end, but maybe this was her way of reprimand.

 

Sif studies him, his eyes tired but no longer the wells of addiction. Though her own brand is a gentler concoction. She was one of the few female mixers and knew what it was about the drug that they liked so much. At the end of the day however, she cared about them only in so much that they stayed alive long enough to keep coming back. At least that’s what she told herself.

 

She makes to pass him, pausing to hold his hand like a child’s. When she’s gone Thor looks down at the vial pressed into his palm.

 

\---

 

The needle drops to the ground among other scattered plastics, and aluminum garbage. Thor slumps against the concrete wall, waiting. A wave of longing hit him. He used to chase harder, longer rushes. Ones that would last him almost an entire twenty-four hours. More than enough time to finish a job and cash out. But now his metabolism couldn’t keep up with the warp and Thor was starting to feel his age since retirement.

 

He’ll settle for what he can get and not wind up in the gutter for doing so.

 

It takes but a moment before he can feel each drop of rain on exposed skin, taking a part of him with it as it travels and drips onto the pavement. Bruised clouds roiling past the city outskirts, headed where he was heading, and the wind drawing him in like a mother’s parting embrace as he tries to follow, both stumbling and picking up speed. Yet as he chased after the sensation, stalled by the thick, syrupy humid and polluted air, stirring an almost painful anticipation, the hairs on his neck and arms raised from that drug-induced charge that laced under his skin, artificially pleasant.

 

He breathes deep.

 

In the closing distance, the city’s electric heartbeat comes to life: domes opening as blooming night core, traffic streaming along roads like circuitry, and all of it, a hypnotizing spell of unfolding technological lattices against colorless fog. With no visible night sky, Thor settled for the city’s constellation of lights, and sometimes thought he could discern its terrifying beauty, almost as if the blend of logos, display screens, and high-rises would allow him passage alive through the monolith.

 

\---

Here the overhanging tiers and balconies, cramped vertically upon brutalist angles, choked out much of the natural light, and by then the buzz from the effects of the drug were fading. Night seeped in to the jagged skyline. Thor maintained his focus, recalling the face and information of his target.

 

Poised in the near-centre of the city was the Elysian sector, and within it was where business in brothels for banking nexus intersected. A gargantuan complex that made references to every sin from Babylon to Las Vegas, making no compulsion to disguise the fact – celebrated it even.

 

Tonight there was to be a dex toy private auction.

 

The children of art and science: bioengineering came against and then accelerated past its limits with the technology of replicants. Internet porn, virtual reality - all those old-fashioned carnal options evaporated at the turn of the decade once ease of gene editing, stem cell technology, and test tube organo-grafting met the lucrative business of selling a pound of flesh for cheap - except that it was flesh that would respond to you, breathe your name, send you to an Everest high as the everyday Joe became a self-made god to an artificial organic being made to worship phallus and promote pleasure.

 

These models became the height of popularity with none of the human rights. Life was now just one desperate hedonistic distraction to another, currency scrounged enough for either sustenance, intoxication, or ecstasy. All Thor needs to do is put a bullet through the skull of the wealthiest bidder however, and he’d have enough for all three.

 

For the next little while at least.

 

He kept walking, pausing only to confirm the sound of something or someone dying in the interzone between pleasure houses – architecture sculpted in the likeness of body contours, towards the sensual pink glow of the brightest blocks, nude holographic models danced above the domes, figures swaying in choreography under the low hanging skies, always pregnant with rain. Paradise was the name of this part: a kinder breed of sin than the world spinning rotten on its axis.

 

Drawn to his incoming heat signature, the simulated dancer sashayed his way to the pulse of the music. Her programmed motions beckoned him into the establishment. Her eyes promised any genetically designed partner he could ever desire. Thor had no doubt of such if he were here for that. She then seductively crouches at ground level, filling his sight with her towering figure. She winks as he walks in, and moans upon entrance, before closing the junction of her legs together and rising.

 

\---

 

Like most modern structures, the interiors followed their own surreal logic, depending on the class of clientele they were trying to attract. On the grungier end of the spectrum, the ones Thor was used to, models danced in the tinted window cells of honeycombed rooms, a hive of desire for the fevered mind.

 

But here brought forth to mind the kind of clean and sterile design where art and crime were one and the same. It was beautiful in its simplicity, which in of itself belied unthinkable complexity. Electronically controlled sliding doors of black glass opened before him and closed behind him. Somewhere in the complex, the facial recognition software had been overwritten. When he reaches the inside sanctum, an attendant in chrome greets him with a name that isn’t his. A hominoid instead of a replicant: a dark cranial plate covering where eyes would’ve been.

 

He’s led to a circular performance room, ribbed along the sides like an insect egg. He’s able to crouch down near the far side of the stage to do so – and his chromato-camouflage coat does the rest. As long as he stays still. He loads the gun’s integral silencer.

 

And waits.

 

Part of the night is sure to be a spectacle that he’ll have the opportunity to witness. He can’t deny he’s curious. It’s not yet midnight, but he imagines the number of ways this can play out given the stage: something of a combination of giant curved plasma screen and runway.

 

His leg is starting to cramp just as the magnates, politicians, and corporate kingpins arrive. Those who built and owned fortunes in everything from corporate power to cybernetic tech. It was an odd sense of immortality that Thor somehow wondered upon, that killing any one of them would do nothing, barely even cause a ripple, in the vast riverbanks of future memory. By the time he’s done here, an executive dead, another who was groomed to do so will assume the vacated position and ascend the ladder of power.

 

Wine poured and resinous smoke filled the air. The ever self-amused banal pleasantries and mannerisms of individuals who ran the world according to their vision. They sat down in sleek leather chairs from animals recently extinct, in suits of carbon black.

 

Once the men were settled, the attendant gestured to the screen. Where it had been white and blank, a shadow like that of a figure coming forth from the other side of frosted glass emerged, until the glazed surface parted before him like that of water – though it was impossible, such was the textural illusion.

 

Most of the men leaned forward in their seats and put their glasses aside. The model was beautiful.

 

Sable and sleek, in outfit and posture. The lapels of his blazer had a raven sheen. Underneath the plunging neck line was no business white shirt however, only an expanse of pale and pure skin – untouched, and eyes like the enduring green of money – everything about the model screamed wealth.

 

He smiled, calmly.

 

A hush overcame everyone. Lines of light began to form, hypnagogic and sinuous. Verticals and horizontals, stretching around the canvas of the screen like moonbeams. A slender pole emerged from the front of the stage just as music pulsed to life. Hooking his heel around the pole, his movements woke to a sensuous mosaic of sounds and mellow beats.

 

He danced like a dream.

 

Thor couldn’t help but stare at the performance and the one giving it. The model’s design was lovely in a kind of spare, neat elegance. His motions didn’t suffer from any of the uncanny valley effect of limbs with no muscle memory, as was usually characteristic of newly produced models, despite the efforts of their bioengineering. Thor didn’t recognize the boy’s face as anything close to resembling the generic pay for play archetypes either, though his features were lovely. He must’ve been a custom design version, patronized by those only in the upper echelons of wealth, and he danced with the knowledge that desire belonged to him – the kind that would pay any fee.

 

The men looked down to input their bids before the dance had even finished. The attendant vocalizing one ludicrous number after another. The demonstration had been flawless after all. However, one individual consistently placed generously higher sums above the others, until one by one, they had to forfeit the round, and his was the insurmountable offer.

 

Thor winced in the darkness. One could’ve leveled a city with that kind of currency.

 

But then again, it was entirely possible that such an amount had already been made that way and was now used for thus.

 

The hominoid congratulated the man on his purchase in robotic detachment, after confirming the final numbers. It then escorted the others out. Suddenly, strangely, as if he had temporarily forgotten his purpose here, it was left to just him, his target, and the luxury line dex toy between them.

 

In the entire time since his entrance, the model had not spoken. Neither did he choose to say anything now as its new owner walked towards the base of the stage, a curt fingered motion for the dex toy to come down.

 

He didn’t, and Thor frowned.

 

Anything but complete obedience was a strange response, though it wasn’t unheard of for certain lines to have characteristics. Some customers liked the semblance of…resistance.

 

The man, grey haired and probably older than his natural lifespan should have dictated, didn’t seem to mind however. He chuckled and tossed the cigar away, offering him the stem of his wine glass instead. The model, looking curious, knelt down close to the edge.

 

His owner stepped up onto the low stage instead.

 

The dex toy seemed almost naïve to what was in store. Thor felt a distant guilt jab at him. In this world, pleasure replicant models were not known for durability. Brand quality was an inconsistent feature that varied extensively, depending on life expectancy, accelerated aging, low intelligence, as well as disease susceptibility.

 

Without legal rights, the majority of replicants were left in the hands of owners who were cruel. Ease of discardment standard, expected. Flogged agriculture fields could use the fertilizer after decades of overproduction and throttling climate change.

 

He shakes his head and refocuses. Bringing his gun up. Steady.

 

His target grinned leeringly at his purchase, cupping his toy’s face before jerking his chin upwards. He worked his thumb between the boy’s lips, forcing them open. Teasing at the wet heat.

 

That seemed to initiate a reaction. The boy moaned, and Thor was again caught off guard. He was pushed down, the man’s hands becoming greedy for his prize – his living, breathing status symbol. Thor couldn’t see the expression on the model’s face, from this angle he could see the lecherous pervert’s though.

 

He curses inwardly for waiting. Trying to get a clean aim, but his target was busy biting down on that pale column of neck, eliciting a cry from the model’s lips.

 

 _‘C’mon, c’mon. Just raise yourself up enough to get me the shot.’_ he begs.

 

But the fumbling and groping doesn’t lend itself well to his pleas. The man had undone the buttons and Thor tried to see as clearly as he could past the bared shoulder of the replicant. Those wrinkled, deplorable hands explored the planes of the model’s body, travelling downwards and further downwards to squeeze—the boy’s face gasps in pain, his hands trying weakly to push the owner away.

 

Thor’s finger rests on the trigger, biding.

 

The man forces the model’s wrists above his head and leans back to look at the picture of impending ruination—

 

Thor takes it.

 

It’s silent until the sound of the bullet’s exit wound took with it a fragment of skull and flesh that landed all the way on the wall behind the sad excuse for a human being with a visceral clunk. The body slumped, undignified, on the figure beneath, who laid shell-shocked with fear and relief.

 

But the relief was short-lived when Thor stepped out from the shadows, the chromato-camouflage coat no longer as effective from movement. Alarm flickered across those beautiful features again. Like the moment before a flock of alighting birds, but to his credit the boy did not scream.

 

He only froze.

 

 _Beautiful. And still intact._ Thor thought to himself.

 

The assignment was done. The scene here required no further attention, technically, but Thor’s own heart rate had yet to return to baseline. Those jewel green eyes stay on him.

 

A number of possibilities shuffled through Thor’s mind then. All of them the same outcome: the replicant’s future as a dex toy was clear. All he had done was guarantee the establishment another transaction to bank. To pass through one pair of hands and then another. A few years at best, to be used and mistreated.

 

He’s seen what happens to their type, the way their bodies decayed like any other being of organic matter.

 

Thor swallows.

 

He’s also seen what happens to his type when they steal on the job after they’re caught.

 

\---

 

Maybe he wasn’t thinking. Maybe the drugs really did alter his frayed judgement. Maybe he was more condemned after retirement than he thought. Because his choice just then was the one of a man with nothing to lose.

 

There’s a pale wrist in his grip, slender and fine. Delicate even. And Thor’s trying very hard not to run too fast that the other can’t keep up, but part of him is too afraid to look back.

 

They run out into the street as rain picks up again, casting the holographic lighting into broken needles of neon.

 

**Author's Note:**

> Dex = Dual Sex
> 
> A comment, if you please, would certainly go a long way. <3


End file.
